The pillar post, how real estate agents use live inspection video, listed the final walkthrough as one of the five spots where an agent ends up explaining a house to somebody who is not in it. This is that one, and it is the one where the agent holds the phone.
Closing is tomorrow morning. The buyer took a job two time zones west and started three weeks ago, and the flight back for a forty minute final walkthrough is not happening. The agent has a key and a list: the three repairs that were supposed to be done, the washer and dryer that were supposed to stay, the shed full of paint cans that was supposed to go. The buyer has the same list in their inbox and a meeting at two, their time.
The old way is the agent walking through alone, then texting a dozen photos and "all good, the water heater is in." The buyer signs the next morning on the strength of a text message. Usually that is fine. When it is not, it is the thing they remember about buying the house.
What a final walkthrough from another time zone is not
This is not the inspector's re-inspection. If the repair list came off my report and somebody wants a professional to confirm the flashing was actually redone rather than caulked over, that is a separate visit, and it is mine to do.
The final walkthrough is the agent's job. They are walking the house on the buyer's behalf to see that it is the house the buyer agreed to buy: the repairs happened, what was meant to stay stayed, what was meant to go went, and nothing new happened in between. It does not need my ladder. It needs the buyer's eyes, and those are in another time zone.
So the agent signs in on their own phone, taps Go live, and texts the buyer a link. The buyer taps it and watches in the browser already on their phone. No app, no account, nothing asking for their camera. Two minutes of setup, most of it the text.
Walk the list, not the house
An agent who walks the house room by room produces a tour. The buyer half-remembers the house from one Saturday showing and is now trying to match a tour to a list, from a meeting they stepped out of. Walk the list instead.
Start with the repairs, because those are the items with a chance of being wrong. Say the item before you show it. "Item one, the dryer vent that was disconnected in the attic." Then the phone goes up the hatch and stays there long enough to see the duct is clamped. "Item two, the GFCI in the hall bath." Press the test button on camera.
Then what stays: hold on the washer and dryer, then on the garage fridge.
Then what goes. The shed. The basement corner where the old owner kept tires. Empty is a finding, so say the word and hold the shot long enough to be unambiguous.
Then a plain lap of the rest: every room, lights on, faucets run, one slow pan. Say "kitchen, nothing new" and move on. The boring rooms are on the recording too, which turns out to matter.
The narration habit is the one I use on a roof for somebody who cannot see the slope: name the room and the wall before the thing, and say the size, because a phone screen throws away scale. Narrating a roof inspection out loud is aimed at inspectors, and it applies to an agent holding a phone in a laundry room.
The buyer flags the frames
The viewer side is watch-only. The buyer cannot talk into the stream, and there is no chat. What they can do is tap "I have a question about this," which saves the frame they were looking at, with a short note if they want, and puts that frame on the agent's screen while the agent is still in the house.
The buyer sees a scuffed wall in the stairwell that they do not remember. They tap. The agent, still in the stairwell, sees the frame, walks back three steps and holds on the scuff. Nobody interrupts anybody, and nothing gets lost in the gap before a phone call.
Every flagged frame stays with the recording. The next morning, before signing, the buyer can open the frames they flagged and see what the agent showed them in reply.
Voice questions happen afterward, by phone. Say that up front. And the agent should not take a call while live, since answering on an iPhone suspends the stream. Finish the walk, end the inspection, then call.
A recording dated the day before closing
The live part is for the buyer. The recording is for the morning after.
It starts on its own when the agent taps Go live and lands in the account's dashboard, not on the agent's phone, with the flagged frames, any stills the agent captured, and a timestamped history of when it started, when the buyer joined, and when it ended. So there is a record, made the day before closing, of what condition the house was in and what was in it, narrated by the person who walked it, with the buyer's own questions marked on it.
Six weeks later, when the buyer calls because the garage fridge was not the one they thought it was, the agent does not have to remember. They open the recording. Timestamps a phone clock cannot explain away is about why the dated part matters more than it seems.
The recording is private, reached through short-lived signed links and never a public URL, and how long it stays available runs by plan. It is also a recording of somebody's house, so who it gets sent to is a decision the agent makes on purpose. The security page covers who can open what.
What it does not settle
The walkthrough is a look, not a test. Nobody can smell a damp basement through a phone, and nobody can tell from video whether the "repaired" flashing is a real repair or a bead of caulk. If the repair was structural or on the roof, the buyer needs a person who knows the difference standing there, and that is a re-inspection, not a walkthrough.
It also does not decide anything. What the buyer does about a scuffed wall or a shed that did not get emptied is between the buyer, their agent, and whoever advises them. The walk just makes sure that when they decide, they have seen the house as it is the day before closing, and not a text that says all good.
The mechanics of the link, and why the buyer's phone never asks for a camera, are on the how it works page.
InspectStream records what an inspector observed. It is not a public adjusting service and does not prepare, negotiate, or advise on insurance claims.